Enchantment Passing Through
by TechnicolorNina
Summary: Two years after leaving Egypt, Yugi discovers "happily ever after" might not be true. Puzzleshipping. *Sequel to A Thousand Paper Cranes*
1. Mark: Six Months Later

Okay, originally this was supposed to be the epilogue to TPC. As it happened, I was told it worked better as a prologue to the sequel. That means that once I get the actual story back from my beta, it'll go here. In the meantime, have some prologue.

**Title:** Enchantment Passing Through  
**Author:** Nina/TechnicolorNina  
**Pairing/Characters:** Uh . . . in the prologue, only Yuugi/Atem (puzzleshipping/blindshipping). There will be a couple of incidental relationships later.  
**Word Count:** Approximately 2000.  
**Page Count: **5 pages in Microsoft Word.  
**Rating:** This fic is rated** T** for **language, implied yaoi, **and** violence**.  
**Genre:** Light but fairly constant angst, with romance and just a bit of fluff.  
**Disclaimer:** The author hereby apologizes for playing with things/places/characters/books/movies/manga/musicals that do not (and probably never will) belong to her. Please do not take the money she does not have to begin with. Tony, however, belongs to ME. Got it? (If you want to use him in a story, by all means feel free to ask for his backstory and I'll give it to you. But please credit me, 'kay?)  
**Spoilers:** Post-YGO. That means if you don't know what happens to Yugi's "other me" ("Yami" for American dub-watchers), don't know his real name, or don't know how his storyline is resolved, you don't want to read this unless you don't mind being spoilered. 'Kay? Also, it's a **sequel.** That means you should probably read A Thousand Paper Cranes first.  
**Warnings:** None for the prologue, but you might as well know that you'll run into some pretty scary stuff later.  
**Feedback:** There may be something out there that's better than a review containing concrit, but if there is, I haven't found it yet. So if you have two minutes and you wouldn't mind? Please? Arigatou. (And concrit is cool. Flames are not.)  
**Notes:** This sequel? Totally not necessary. That doesn't mean it's not good, though, and if you're up for a bit of post-TPC adventure, here it is.  
**Special Thanks/Dedications:** To my first reader, Miss Dawn. You're wonderful, darling.

* * *

Yugi laughed quietly as Anzu and Atem held a side-glance staring match.

"Game starts when the music begins!"

Yuugi watched the pair attack his dance mats with almost unhealthy fervor. Sometimes he wondered which Anzu liked more: him, or his beta-test versions of DDR games.

Yuugi saw Jounouchi stomp in and kick off his shoes.

"Hey, guys!"

Anzu squealed as she nearly slipped on the mat. Yuugi felt grateful he'd put velcro on the bottoms. "Damn it, Jounouchi! Whose side are you on?"

Jounouchi assessed the match. Atem was doing fairly well considering he'd only ever played against Yuugi, and then only rarely. "Atem's."

Anzu huffed. Had Atem not been busy following the plethora of multicolored arrows on the screen, he probably would have smiled. Yuugi laughed into his hand. Jounouchi plunked down next to him on the sofa.

"What's up, man?"

Yuugi shrugged. "Not much."

Jounouchi leaned over and lowered his voice. "Enjoying the view?"

Yuugi elbowed him in the ribs. "I'm not _that_ perverted. And you can't see anything anyway." It was true; Atem had taken to stealing Yuugi's pajama bottoms for DDR matches.

Jounouchi snorted. Anzu sat down just behind the dance mat as the scores scrolled up. Atem joined her.

"See, I told you I'd beat you."

Atem shrugged. "Forgive me for playing my first video game four months ago."

Anzu got back onto her mat. "Yuugi, it's your turn."

Yuugi hauled himself off the sofa, then paused. "Jounouchi? You want a go?"

"Think I'll check out the competition first."

Atem slid out of the way so Yuugi could take his place.

"Pick a song."

Yuugi scrolled the list. "Midnight Special?"

"Sure."

"Ready?"

"Always."

Yuugi pressed the corner button. It wasn't until they were moving that he realized he'd let Anzu have the smaller mat. Oh, well . . .

Two minutes later found Anzu pushing her hair off her face. She and Yuugi exchanged a glance and started laughing. Atem raised an eyebrow.

"I don't suppose this joke is available to everyone."

Yuugi shrugged. "Well, I don't know about Anzu, but I was just thinking: if she beat me, does that mean she's the king of games now?"

Jounouchi started laughing. Atem just rolled his eyes as their scores scrolled up. Yuugi exchanged another look with Anzu. His laughter redoubled.

"Um . . . I guess I'll let Jounouchi play." Anzu sat down.

"Why? You got a double- oh."

Their scores were tied.

Yuugi folded the DDR mats carefully. "Okay, guys, obligatory question time. What'd you think?"

"That one girl keeps freezing. The one in the blue miniskirt." Jounouchi waved his hand at the blank screen. "But the music's good."

"And there's a time lag on Midnight Special. I noticed it both times the song played," Anzu supplied. Yuugi scribbled their comments in a notebook before sliding the pads carefully into the cupboard.

"Okay."

Anzu leaned forward to rub her legs. "I can't believe you actually get paid for this."

Yuugi looked up at her and grinned. "Neither can I, actually." He heard the mail truck pull up outside. "Be right back."

Five minutes found him back in the living room, a few envelopes and a small box in hand. He flicked quickly through the envelopes before setting them on the bookshelf.

"No shipping today, huh?" Jounouchi took a drink from a soda pop Atem had provided. Yuugi shook his head.

"We had a couple of things going out. That's it." He held up the box. "And I got this."

"Ooh, what is it?"

Yuugi shrugged. "It says it's from Tony."

Anzu leaned forward, interested. "Oh, wow."

Yuugi grinned widely and pulled out his cell phone. "I think I might have an idea, though . . . "

The space of twenty seconds found him with Tony's phone ringing in his ear.

"_Diga_."

"Hi, Tony."

"Hey, Fish. What's up?"

Yuugi put the cell on speakerphone, then turned the box over in his hands. Jounouchi pulled out a pocket knife and handed it to him. Yuugi slit the tape across the flaps, but didn't open it.

"So I just got the mail today, and I got a box from you. I thought you said you didn't celebrate Christmas."

Tony snorted. "I can tell you didn't open it yet. We got into the burial chamber about three weeks ago. You want to take a guess what we found when we opened it?"

"The sarcophagus was empty?" He went to work on the tape on the sides.

"Not quite. There was no body, but there was something in there, all right. Go ahead and open it."

Yuugi opened the box and was confronted with a sea of styrofoam packing peanuts. He plunged his hands into them. Anzu squealed as a small wave of packing peanuts landed in her lap.

"Who's that?"

"Umm . . . Anzu." Yuugi's fingers trawled the bottom of the box.

"That girl from the picture you had on the nightstand?"

"That's the one." His fingers encountered something small and hard, and he pulled out a plain cardboard box no more than an inch square on all sides. It was heavy. He shook it.

"Didn't know you had friends over."

"Everyone's here but Honda and Bakura. They're - well, Bakura's got classes. Honda's working." Yuugi slit the tape on the smaller box.

"Yo," Jounouchi greeted. Anzu rolled her eyes at him.

"_Hola_." Jounouchi stared at the phone as Anzu giggled. Yuugi just smiled and shook his head as he slid one finger under the flap.

"Okay, I'm pretty sure this has to be what I'm looking for . . . "

His finger caught on a strip of cotton batting. He tugged it out, and something fell into his lap with a flash of gold. He scooped it out of his lap and held it up, speechless. Jounouchi was the first to speak.

"Man, that's - !"

Yuugi wound his fingers through the thin leather cord and held it up, well away from his face. The gold piece attached to it glittered in the lamplight.

"Okay, how did you get this?"

"That's what we found when we opened the sarcophagus, Fish. One Millennium Puzzle, in pieces."

"But how did it _get_ there? I didn't put it there."

"I was actually hoping you could tell me. I got the rest of it sitting in my trunk at home."

Anzu carefully unwound the cord from Yuugi's fingers and examined the piece she'd first seen as the central piece in the Millennium Puzzle. The eye engraved on it winked back at her.

"It'll never be put together again, will it?" she asked.

"Actually, I put the rest of it together in three and a half minutes."

Yuugi's mouth fell open. "But – how? I mean, I spent eight years trying to put that thing together."

"The curse is broken," Atem murmured. "It doesn't need to be difficult to put together anymore. It's just a puzzle now."

"That's what I figured," Tony said. "Except I'm not so sure it's just a puzzle. I turned the whole damn thing on its head to try and make that piece go in, and it _still_ fell out."

"Tony, if you had the front side of the puzzle facing up, it _couldn't_ fall out."

"I got it on video, if you want to see it. I'm not gonna try to explain it, because I don't think I could. But it did. And I just figured maybe it wanted to go home."

Yuugi poked cautiously at the piece of puzzle now dangling from Anzu's fingers. "Go home, right. Tony, it's an Egyptian artifact. In case you haven't noticed, I live in Japan."

Anzu passed the piece to Jounouchi. Atem followed it with his eyes.

"If it's true that home is where your heart is, then it's home. Trust me, there's such a thing as a native at heart, Fish. I should know."

Yuugi watched the piece sparkle between Jounouchi's fingers, then turned his eyes on Atem. "What do you think?"

Atem reached out for the gold piece hesitantly. Yuugi wondered if he was afraid of being zapped back inside of it.

"One of the properties of the Millennium items is that they'll always find their way into the hands of those best equipped to take care of them. Whether for good or for ill, they'll always make their way to the people who would guard them, no matter what." He sighed and let his finger trail down the side of the piece. "I sincerely hope it's the only one that made its way free, though. I'm not going to lie about that."

"It's the only one we found," Tony said. Yuugi saw a look of grim satisfaction settle on Atem's face, and reached for his hand. "I'm pretty sure I know where the rest are, but getting to them is pretty much out of the question. It's too dangerous. Hold on a minute." There were a few muffled shouts, and then he came back on the line.

"Sorry about that. We just got to the site."

"That's fine. Take care of yourself."

"Take care of that puzzle piece," Tony answered. "I get the feeling it's not called the Heart of the King for nothing." His voice faded out slightly. "_Ay! _Darla! _You don't go into the fucking site alone!_" He came back on the line. "I gotta let you go, Fish."

"Okay. Bye."

"_Adios._"

The screen of Yuugi's cell flashed and went dark as Tony hung up. Yuugi stared at it, and then at the gold piece Atem was turning over in his fingers. Tony had wrapped the two posts at the top in pieces of leather cord, then wound the cord around the piece through the grooves on the sides. Yuugi wondered if it were the kind of thing Tony did often; not only did it look good, he could probably wear the entire thing anywhere he wanted and never have to worry about losing it. On which note . . .

"Atem, when he called that piece the Heart of the King, what did he mean?" Anzu beat him to the question. Atem took several seconds before answering.

"I'm not entirely sure," he admitted. "But if I had to identify any piece of the puzzle separate from the others, that's probably the only piece I could recognize right away." He held it up by the cords Tony had secured it with.

"Do you want to wear it?"

Yuugi considered, then nodded. "That way I know it's not just going to mysteriously go somewhere."

Atem actually chuckled. "That's probably a good idea." He leaned forward to tie the cord around Yuugi's neck.

"It suits you, aibou."

Yuugi smiled and displayed the piece to Anzu and Jounouchi. "What do you guys think?"

"If you wake up soulless tomorrow, you better not have a problem with me using your beta-test money to take that stupid thing to Egypt so I can get you back, man," Jounouchi answered. Anzu giggled. Yuugi stood up on the sofa to examine it in the mirror.

"Just send the piece back to Tony and let him do it." He ran his thumb over the eye. The piece had been sitting in a box for hours, and Yuugi could see snow on the ground. All the same it was warm, as though someone had set it in a shaft of warm sunlight for an hour or two.

"Anyway, I don't think it wants to hurt anybody now." The eye glittered back at him. In the right light, Yuugi thought, it might even look like it was winking. "Tony was right."

"Right about what?" Anzu tilted her head to look up at him.

"It's home."


	2. Mark: Two Years Later

**ETA: **I apologise to the readers who suffered through the site's removal of my formatting. You suck, Pit. Anyway, enjoy the re-formatted version! Older readers may want to take note that this version has also been somewhat edited for content.

**Title:** Enchantment Passing Through  
**Author:** Nina/TechnicolorNina  
**Pairing/Characters:** Primarily **puzzleshipping/blindshipping** (**Atem/Yuugi**). However, you'll also find a small amount of **Anzu/Ryou**, and also an OC/OC (Tony/Alexei, for those who care) that shows up for all of about ten seconds.  
**Universe:** Yu-Gi-Oh!. More specifically, the Yu-Gi-Oh! manga (although one of my readers on GJ has only seen the anime and loved this all the same).  
**Word Count:** Approximately 15 500. The word counter lies.  
**Page Count:** 35 pages in Microsoft Word.  
**Rating:** This fic is rated** T** for **language, implied yaoi, occult themes, some scary moments, some abuse, **and **violence**.  
**Genre:** Light but fairly constant angst, with romance and just a bit of fluff.  
**Disclaimer:** The author hereby apologizes for playing with things/places/characters/books/movies/manga/musicals that do not (and probably never will) belong to her. Please do not take the money she does not have to begin with. Tony, however, belongs to ME. Got it? (If you want to use him in a story, by all means feel free to ask for his backstory and I'll give it to you. But please credit me, 'kay?)  
**Spoilers:** Post-YGO. That means if you don't know what happens to Yugi's "other me" ("Yami" for American dub-watchers), don't know his real name, or don't know how his storyline is resolved, you don't want to read this unless you don't mind being spoilered. 'Kay?  
**Warnings:** I believe I covered this in the prologue. Um, if you're okay with demons, you're probably okay.  
**Feedback:** There may be something out there that's better than a review containing concrit, but if there is, I haven't found it yet. So if you have two minutes and you wouldn't mind? Please? Arigatou. (And concrit is cool. Flames are not.)  
**Notes:** None.  
**Special Thanks/Dedications:** Dedicated to my wonderful First Reader, Miss Dawn, and all the wonderful people who reviewed A Thousand Paper Cranes.

* * *

"Atem?" Yugi watched his partner nervously. Atem usually glanced up to indicate he was aware it was his turn, but Yugi had checked his king almost two minutes ago without so much as a sigh to mark it. Yugi peered at him. Unless he was entirely mistaken, Atem wasn't even blinking.

He shook his head and blinked twice, then played his king out of check. Yugi took only a single glance at the board before moving his bishop.

"Checkmate."

Atem sighed and sat back. Yugi gathered the pieces and set them back up automatically.

"Atem, are you feeling okay?" He might lose a game once in awhile - even Atem was human - but three in a row was absolutely unheard of. And this last had gone on for no more than ten minutes before Yugi had beaten him - capturing more than half his pieces into the bargain. Maybe someone was messing with the thermostat in hell.

Atem smiled. "Just a little tired," he said, and Yugi nodded.

"Do you want to take a nap?"

Atem looked scornful. "People who take naps on their day off are either lazy or too old to be working." He considered the board, then swept the pieces into their storage bag. "But I might take a walk."

Yugi watched him go, then headed for the kitchen. Dishes had a tendency to be neglected on days when neither of them were working. He took the phone from the wall, dialed, and then wedged it firmly between his shoulder and ear before opening the dishwasher.

"Moshi moshi."

"Hi, Naru," Yugi said, hooking the top rack open with his elbow. "Is Anzu there?"

"She went to get - she's back," Anzu's room mate answered. Yugi could hear a door in the background. "Anzu, telephone!"

"Hello?"

"Hi, Anzu." Yugi pushed the top rack back in and hooked the bottom rack out with his knee. Someday he was going to start remembering to open the rack before loading his hands up with dishes.

"Yugi!" She sounded surprised, and why not? Not too long ago "Yugi and Atem" and "day off" in the same sentence had meant "don't call unless somebody's in the hospital."

"I was wondering if you were doing anything this afternoon." Yugi grabbed the soap and filled the soap container.

". . . not really," Anzu answered. Yugi could hear the hesitation in her voice. "Why?"

Yugi turned the dial on the dishwasher and rinsed the sink. "I'm bored and I don't have anything to do, and I haven't seen you in more than a week."

"But - it's your day off, isn't it?"

Yugi nodded into the phone as he sat down at the table. "Yeah."

"But . . . "

"Atem said he was going for a walk." Yugi traced an indistinct shape on the wood. "He's been spending a lot of time alone lately."

There was a pause, and when Anzu spoke, her voice was careful - a woman crossing a stream on mossy stones. "Are you two . . . okay? I mean - "

"We're fine when he's around," Yugi replied. "He just . . . I don't know. I'd say it had something to do with our anniversary or my birthday or something, but you know how Atem is."

Anzu knew perfectly well. Atem couldn't be trusted to leave even the slightest trace of his plans - even large ones. Yugi had confided once that he half-suspected Atem somehow managed to be in two places at once, and that while he was sitting at a Risk board or advising someone at the shop he was also downtown shopping for whatever he deemed appropriate for a given holiday. Anzu had had to admit she wouldn't put it past him.

"Maybe he's still trying to figure out how to use the computer and he's spending a lot of time at the library." It was a lame suggestion and Anzu knew it, but she could hear melancholy creeping into Yugi's voice and was determined to stem it.

"Yeah, and maybe someday I'm going to hit six feet tall. Anzu, the last thing in the world he'd do is admit to someone he doesn't know that there's something he doesn't know how to do. Especially something I do every single day with no trouble at all." The daily know-how Atem had picked up when Yugi had been his vessel had not been in evidence when Yugi had brought him back from the afterlife, and Atem had come back into Yugi's life not even knowing how to turn on a light switch. Three years had not been enough for him to completely make the change from ancient pharaoh to an ordinary citizen of the twenty-first century.

"I guess that's true," Anzu said. "Is he still denying that time he blew up the microwave a couple years ago?"

Yugi chuckled into the phone. "He didn't blow it up, Anzu. He just . . . caught it on fire. But he's never forgotten since that you have to take the foil off if you want to have a microwave left when you're done."

Something warm and wet lapped against Yugi's foot. He looked down.

"Shoot!" He jumped up and slammed the dishwasher open. "_Darn_ it!"

"Yugi? Yugi, are you okay?"

Yugi took a deep breath. Then he looked at the bottle of soap on the counter and started to laugh. It was a mess, true, but . . .

"I knew I should have been more specific when I made that shopping list for him."

"Uh-oh. What did he do?"

"He, um . . . " Yugi grabbed the counter before the suds on the floor could send him flying. His socks were soaked. "He got dish soap instead of dishwasher soap."

"Oh, no!"

Yugi eased his way from the tile onto the rug in front of the sink. The heavy bracelet on his wrist clanked against the metal of the sink, an unmusical song. "Yeah." He looked down at the floor again. "I guess I'm not going anywhere today after all."

"Want help for the cleanup crew?"

Yugi smiled. "Yeah, sure. We can put in a movie or something once the floor's dry." He paused. "And after I do the dishes."

* * *

"Hey! Earth to Atem! Man, are you in there?"

Atem's head jerked up. Jounouchi was standing at the counter, his eyebrows raised.

"Just thinking. I thought I locked that already." And he had. _Must_ have. He was holding the keys. He hadn't even clipped them back to his belt yet. "What are you doing up here?"

_Did I just fall asleep right here with my keys in my hand?_

"Just wondering if you were doing anything for lunch, actually. I was only working a half-day today, and I know Yugi's busy. I wouldn't mind some decent company."

"I might take you up on that. Let's get out of here." Atem shrugged into his jacket. It was almost June and Jounouchi was walking around in nothing but a short-sleeved shirt and light slacks, but to Atem it felt like the dead of winter. He was slowly getting used to the colder temperatures here, but sometimes he thought he'd give a lot for one day at a hundred and ten.

As he locked the door to the shop and then tugged it to make sure it was tight, he thought for sure he'd already secured the bar once.

* * *

"Where do you think you're going?"

Yugi's hand fell through the place where the doorknob had been only moments before, and he turned around, not quite irritated just yet. One thing about Atem that never changed was his incredibly strange sense of humor.

"I'm - "

The words - _I'm supposed to help Anzu paint the living room, I told you that last night_ - died in his mouth. He was looking at the Atem of his worst nightmare - a man whose recognition of him was nothing more than contempt and whose madness was clear and dangerous. And there was something, something about his eyes -

Atem blinked. Then he glanced at the clock, and Yugi found himself looking at a different man altogether.

"Aibou, aren't you going to be late to help Anzu?"

Yugi's mouth fell open of its own accord.

"Uh - yeah. I need to - "

Atem reached around him and opened the door, then kissed his cheek.

"Take care, aibou."

Yugi nodded. It was his practice to add "love you" every time he walked out the door, but he was in too much shock to think of even saying goodbye.

Atem's brow furrowed as he shut the door behind Yugi. His partner was small but sturdy, his mind clear and steady. It was almost impossible to truly scare him, and yet the Yugi he'd just seen out the door had been pale as milk. If he hadn't already been late enough to have to either run or take the car -

Atem thought to ask him about it that night, but by then it had slipped his mind completely - the idea stolen from him, most likely, as he stood next to the sink unmoving for nearly ten minutes.

* * *

"Um, hi. Is Tony there?" Yugi curled on Anzu's couch, a pillow pressed to his stomach. Enough was enough. He waited ten years in the thirty seconds before he heard a click as the line switched over.

"_Diga_."

Yugi let out a breath he hadn't been aware he was holding. He'd been incredibly sure the boy who'd answered the phone was going to come back and tell him Tony was nowhere to be found.

"Tony."

"Hey, Fish!" Tony's voice brightened considerably. "I haven't heard from you in donkey's years."

"Yeah, things have been kind of busy. Listen, Tony, I don't want to talk for too long because I'm on Anzu's phone and her weekend plan doesn't cover international calls, but - "

"What happened to your cell?" Tony's voice changed from mellow to sharp.

"I think Atem's watching it and I don't want him to know I called you."

He could almost see Tony sitting down on his bed and swinging his legs up, pressing his hands to his eyes. "Wait, wait, wait, wait. Atem?"

"Yes."

"Pharaoh Atem? The Atem who worships the ground you walk on?"

Yugi thought that might be laying it on just a bit thick, but didn't protest. "That's the one."

"Why the hell would he be watching your phone? You haven't - "

"I haven't been seeing anyone else and he's not abusing me. That's why I wanted to talk to you."

Tony sighed. "All right, I get the feeling this is gonna be ugly. Lay it on me."

"Do you - I mean - I know you've spent a lot of time working in the tombs, and you said you believed in magic - "

"The occult, Fish. There's a difference. Magic is a bunch of little kids waving sticks and pretending they're wands. Big difference."

"Yeah, but it still has to do with the supernatural, doesn't it?"

"It doesn't 'have to do with the supernatural,' Fish. It_ is_ the supernatural. Why?"

Yugi bit his lip. This was it - the question that decided pretty much everything.

"Tony, have you ever heard of any spells or curses or anything that can change someone's memory?"

Tony's voice grew cautious. "Maybe you better explain that before I answer you."

Yugi took a deep breath. "Lately - well, not _lately_, it started maybe a month ago - Atem's been having these . . . I don't know. I guess you could call them blackouts. Like - he's losing time. Last week I went out for milk and when I came back twenty minutes later he thought I'd never gone. And then today - " Yugi swallowed hard and then related the incident with the doorknob. Tony whistled.

"I hate to say this, Fish, but it sounds like you got someone on your hands who's either got a split personality or schizophrenia."

"Split personalities can't change your eyes."

He heard the creak of bedsprings - surely Tony swinging his legs back off the bed and maybe even standing up.

"Whaaaat?"

"I'm not exactly sure how to explain it," Yugi admitted. "But I've been sleeping next to him for almost three years. I'm pretty sure I know what his eyes look like. And that wasn't it."

"All right. Okay. You haven't been fucking around with a Ouija board, have you?"

"No."

"Taken part in a séance?"

"No."

"Tried to summon anything?"

"No."

"Shit." Yugi heard the chime of Tony's laptop. "All right, let's do a search on this ugly motherfucker. Blackouts." Keys tapped. Tony cursed in Spanish.

"Bad?"

"I _guess_ bad. You couldn't ask me an easy question, like how to train killer bees or something, could you?" Tony sighed again. "Close to five thousand fucking pings - and that's just the library I have on Brian - and you want to know if it's bad."

"Isn't there any way to narrow it down?"

"Not an easy one." The computer chimed again, and Yugi heard a click as Tony shut it. "You think you can live for two and a half weeks?"

"I . . . probably. Why?"

"I'm going on sabbatical. Which is basically when the high-ups say 'you've been working too fucking hard and you're going to take this three-month break whether you want to or not.' And I was going to go visit Dan and Ami for a week or so. They're living in Tokyo now. Alexei and I didn't have plans after that. He won't care."

"But if you're supposed to be on vacation - "

"Fish, if somebody told me I could either dip myself in honey and roll around naked on a hill of fire ants or go on holiday, I'd take the fire ants. Believe me, I'm not happy about this."

Yugi hesitated. The phone vibrated against his ear, and when he pulled it away to check it he saw the name of one of Anzu's co-workers. It decided him.

"If you need to call me, can you do it on our landline? Without telling Atem I called you first?"

It wasn't something he liked, but it had to be done.

* * *

Yugi curled up under the covers, his cell phone resting under his hand. His other hand rested just under his chin, his piece of the Millennium Puzzle held in it tightly. It was well past two o'clock in the morning - closer to three, in fact - but there was no Atem pressed against his back or sprawled across the other half of the bed. He thought it might be the first time since their return from Egypt that he'd had to face the possibility of sleeping alone. Never once in three years had Atem come home past eleven o'clock - midnight at the very latest, and then usually only on inventory nights. He was nothing if not predictable.

Yugi couldn't take it anymore. He swung his legs over the edge of the bed and yanked on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, then grabbed his keys from the dish on the bureau before dragging on a sweatshirt and heading into the night.

He found Atem standing on the bridge in the park. Anyone else might have thought him the romantic-looking stranger, gazing up at the moon or down at its reflection in the water, but Yugi knew better. He wasn't looking at anything. He wasn't looking at anything because though the form on the bridge was Atem's, it was the _other_ who was in control of him, and the _other_ didn't care a damn for the things Atem held dear. The breath Yugi took in was wavery and not at all helpful in steadying him. He planted himself anyway. He had not, after all, jogged nearly a mile and a half to turn back alone.

"A-Atem?"

Yugi took a hesitant step forward and placed a hand on Atem's shoulder.

The response was immediate and frightening. Atem's _other_ spun around, eyes blazing, and then Yugi was on the ground, scrambling backward and trying for his feet at the same time. He toppled, tucked his head - the last thing he needed right now was a broken neck - and rolled. For once he managed to land properly, his feet neatly beneath him, and then there was a warm hand on Yugi's back as the spots in front of his eyes tried to merge into a screen of black.

"Aibou!"

Yugi wheezed, then managed a full breath. The world went gray, and he rested his forehead on his knees, eyes closed, to keep from passing out. Atem caressed his shoulder and let his hand run down Yugi's arm to the bracelet on his wrist.

"Aibou, are you all right?"

Yugi nodded, eyes still closed. Even in the dark he was dizzy.

"What are you doing out here? It's almost eleven o'cl-"

Yugi didn't have to open his eyes to know what had stopped Atem in mid-sentence. He was looking at Yugi's wristwatch. Looking at Yugi's wristwatch, and trying to understand how he could have left the shop just past ten, stopped for only a few minutes on the bridge to look at the water on his way home, and turned around to see Yugi inexplicably on the ground at two minutes to three.

"Come on, let's get you home."

Yugi let Atem pull him to his feet and take his hand. It wasn't Atem he had to be afraid of, and he thought the _other_ might be done making trouble for the night.

And when they were in bed, Atem's arm around Yugi's waist and light, steady breath on the back of his shoulder, Yugi curled up into a tight, miserable ball and buried his face in the corner of his pillow.

It was also the first time he'd ever faced the possibility of sleeping three in a bed, and he hated it just as much as being alone.

* * *

Anzu stood on the balcony of the apartment she shared with two other girls, waiting for Yuugi's car - the one he drove maybe once a month - to appear on the street. Ryou put his chin on her shoulder and slid his arms around her waist.

"Worrying isn't going to get him here any faster, Anzu."

Anzu sighed and rested her weight on her hands. When she pulled them away from the concrete safety barrier, there would be a pebbly imprint on the heels and palms. More than once she'd wished the barrier was a metal railing.

"I know."

A key turned in the door.

"Hello?"

Anzu jumped and spun around. Had Ryou not become used to Anzu's habit of making abrupt starts, stops, and turns at a moment's notice, she likely would have knocked him right over.

"Yuugi!"

It was indeed Yuugi, looking windswept and tired. Behind him was a man with black hair - streaked liberally, Anzu noted absently, with red and purple highlights - and dark skin. Introductions were made all around as they sat - Ryou on the sofa, Tony and Yuugi both crosslegged on the floor. Anzu retreated to get a pitcher of water for them to share, then joined them. Ryou slid off the sofa to complete the circle. Sitting there with Tony's laptop in their midst, they looked like people playing some strange party game.

"I was starting to wonder if you were okay."

"We stopped to drop Tony's stuff at the hotel." Yuugi turned his head, and Anzu gasped.

"Yuugi, what happened to your _face_?"

"I asked him that. He won't tell me." Tony shot Yuugi an irritated glance.

"That's because I hate repeating myself." Yuugi sighed. "Things have gotten worse."

"No _shit_, Sherlock." Anzu had to put a hand over her mouth to keep from giggling aloud. She'd heard Tony's accent before, deep and musical, but it was entirely different hearing it in person. Had she not been able to see the clear imprint of fingers on Yuugi's cheek, she might not have been able to help herself.

"It wasn't him, you know," Yuugi said, and Ryou leaned forward.

"It was the other one. _His_ yami. Right?"

Yuugi nodded. Then he started to laugh. Anzu was not the only one to notice it didn't reach his eyes. "We must make a really great crew of exorcists, you know that? There's four of us, and at least three of us are seriously susceptible to possession."

"Not funny, Fish." Tony opened his laptop and logged on. "Brian says you don't got a lot to be laughing about."

Yuugi shrugged. "You try living with a man who's not even there half the time before lecturing me, okay? It's down to laugh or go crazy, and I can't do that. Because we're all he's got going for him, and you guys aren't the ones living with him."

"He doesn't _know_?" Ryou's eyes were wide. "He hasn't figured it out yet?"

Yuugi shrugged and shook his head. "He knows something's going on, after last week he has to, but . . . he doesn't want to know what it is. I think he thinks he's losing his mind. And he is. But not - not the way he thinks he is. It scares him. He was there once. He doesn't want to go back." Yuugi rubbed the eye of Horus resting just above his collarbone with one thumb, a small gold piece of comfort.

"You know, you'd think after living in your head for a year - "

Yuugi cut Anzu off in mid-sentence. "If it decides it doesn't want Atem to know it's there, he won't know. It's that simple. You remember when all those people started going crazy after I finished the puzzle, Anzu - "

Anzu nodded.

"He was doing all that stuff _at night_," Yuugi said. "And I never felt like I missed sleep. Maybe like I didn't sleep well, yeah, but definitely not like I'd been up and playing with explosives at two in the morning."

"Oh, Jesus Mary and Joseph. He uses _explosives_?" Tony's eyebrows crept toward his hairline.

"Not anymore. I mean, if you give him a lighter he'll play with it for hours, you know the way some people do - " Yuugi mimed flicking a lighter repeatedly - "but I'm not sure if he likes watching it or if he's just still stuck in one thousand B.C. when it comes to the idea of portable fire."

"Definitely not stuck in one thousand B.C.," Anzu injected. "I watched him set a man on fire for threatening to shoot me, Yuugi. He understands what a lighter is."

Tony covered his eyes with his hands. "Goddess love us. He uses explosives _and_ he's a fucking pyromaniac. Somebody tell me he doesn't play with knives. Please."

"Well, sometimes if I'm building a game board for someone he'll help me carve pieces . . . "

Tony groaned. "Wonderful. Just fucking wonderful. Anything else? I gotta worry about him strangling one of us tonight or something?" He didn't miss the look that passed between the other three. Yuugi bit his lip.

"Tony . . . you've heard of the Shadow Games, haven't you?"

* * *

Three hours later found them on their fourth pitcher of water. Yuugi was curled up on the sofa with his head in Anzu's lap. Ryou had decamped for his classes. And Tony was still sitting on the floor, Brian the laptop carefully balanced between his knees, entering data.

"He's been sleeping okay," Yuugi said, then stopped to consider. "The other night - maybe a week and a half ago - he didn't come home until three in the morning. I had to go looking for him. The other one had him stopped on the bridge in the park. But it's the only time anything like that's happened."

"Eating?"

"Like normal."

Tony flicked his eyes up over the laptop's screen. "Nothing unusual at all?"

"Not really. I mean - well - but that's not exactly _recent_."

"What?"

"About a year ago - maybe a little more - he started eating a lot more meat than he used to."

Anzu shifted so she could put her feet on the floor. They tingled. "I remember that. When he first came back with you I wondered if he was some kind of vegetarian or something, and then suddenly every time I came over you guys had meat on the table. It was kind of weird."

Tony frowned. "Shit."

"Bad?"

Tony set the laptop on the floor and stretched his legs. "I'd say so, yeah. You ever seen Little Shop of Horrors?"

Yuugi shook his head. Anzu nodded.

"At least Pretty Girl knows what I'm talking about." Tony stretched his arms above his head until his spine crackled, then dragged his laptop back to its place between his knees. "You want something to grow, you feed it. You want something to grow that likes blood . . . you feed it meat."

Yuugi whimpered and buried his face in Anzu's leg. If he'd paid more attention fourteen months ago, they might not be dealing with this now. Anzu rubbed his shoulder.

"Don't beat yourself up over it, Yuugi," Anzu said. "I mean, if you didn't catch it, and Honda and Ryou and Jounouchi and Jii-chan didn't catch it, and I didn't catch it . . . if it was really unusual, _one_ of us would have realized it, don't you think?"

Yuugi nodded against Anzu's knee, and as a result missed Tony's next question.

"Ay! Fish! You two going to get a room, or are we going to finish this?"

Yuugi raised himself up on one elbow. "Sorry. What'd you say?"

"I asked you if he was different in bed."

Yuugi's face instantly turned bright red, and he sat up straight. "_Tony_!"

The look Tony sent his way was both long-suffering and irritated. "Look, I really don't give a damn what's going on in your bedroom. But I'm trying to knock out as many subclasses as I can here, and this is shit I need to know to do that, okay?" He raised an eyebrow. "Or are you trying to tell me you've been sleeping in the same bed with your personal _Señor_ Perfect for three years and all you do every night is cuddle a little and kiss him goodnight before you hit the sack?"

The flush in Yuugi's cheeks spread. "No, but . . . "

"Then spill."

Yuugi shook his head, the blush still very much in evidence. "Not really." He paused. "_He's_ not. _It_ doesn't like him touching me at all. Even if it doesn't have anything at all to do with - sex."

Tony grinned the grin of a child on Christmas. "For once I hear something I like." He hit Enter decisively. "We're down to just under half."

"That's _it_?" Yuugi stared. Over two thousand options - and they hadn't even started looking at any paper books.

"Will you cut me some fucking slack, Fish? I never had to do this with a full database before, and I don't have anything to go on. We're traveling in a dark maze here."

Anzu poured herself another glass of water. "Well . . . maybe this is a stupid question, but if it _is_ a demon, and that's what you said we're probably looking at, isn't it probably either Egyptian or Japanese? Can't we narrow it down to that?"

"Not really. If it's a random possession, it could be almost anything." Tony shot her a look over the screen of the laptop. "But it was a good try. If we could pinpoint when it started incubating, it'd be even better." Suddenly his fingers relaxed and slid off the keyboard.

"Yuugi."

Yuugi looked up.

"How's your memory when it comes to little stuff?"

Yuugi shrugged. "Okay, I guess."

"Incredible," Anzu added. "You don't give yourself enough credit, Yuugi."

Tony nodded. "I hope Pretty Girl is right. So tell me - these time lapses, when he's not responding to anything - has he ever had one before? _Ever?_ Start with the day you came into the flat and found him on the sofa."

Yuugi shook his head. "I don't think - wait." He stopped in mid-shake. "Yeah. Yeah, he did."

"When?"

"Do you remember the day you took us to the airport?"

"Of course."

"And I asked you if we could -

* * *

_"Um - Tony? Can we stop at the temple before we go to the airport?"_

_Tony cast a glance at Yuugi in the rearview mirror. "If you keep it fast."_

_"Okay."_

_Tony pulled up in a cloud of dust, and Yuugi hopped down from the Jeep. He pulled his bag down with him, and headed into the cool darkness of Aten's shrine._

_"Um - hi. Again." Yuugi stood awkwardly in front of the statue of the god who had given him the greatest gift of his life. Normally he sat down on the floor when he was talking, but if he did, he'd be here for hours, and by then his plane would be long gone. And Tony would be pissed._

_"I - I just wanted to say - thanks. And - " Yuugi shuffled his feet, then pulled a Ziploc baggie out of his carry-on and opened it. He took out the contents and set them on the floor. "This is - for you. I don't remember what it was called - here. But where I'm from, it's called a thank-you gift."_

_Sitting on the floor was the thousand and first paper crane, the only one that was Yuugi and not Atem. He'd folded it carefully out of the rice paper Stephanie had gotten him for Christmas, and filled its wings with cinnamon sticks and a small plastic bag of the loose tea Anzu had sent as part of his birthday present. Next to the bag of tea he'd placed two sticks of Pocky he'd saved - just in case._

_"I think they might be kind of stale," he apologized. "But I kept them in a bag, so they should still be mostly okay. Um - not to tell you what to do or anything, but you might want to take it soon. Chocolate melts in hot weather."_

_A breeze, warm and playful, ruffled through his hair, and he smiled._

_"Aibou, it's time to go."_

_He turned around to smile at Atem, standing just behind his right shoulder._

_"Okay." Yuugi let Atem lead him out of the temple. He was halfway down the steps when he realized he'd left Atem at the top._

_"Hey, are you - are you coming?" For one horrible moment Yuugi thought there must have been some terrible mix-up, and Atem was stuck - not able to leave the country, or maybe even the area near his tomb. _

_"Atem!"_ If he doesn't tell me what's going on, I'm not going anywhere.

_Atem blinked, looked down, smiled. He caught up with Yuugi, and offered no protest when Yuugi grabbed his hand._

_"It's just . . . strange. It feels like the last time I stood here was some time last week - and it all looks so different."_

_Yuugi bit his lip. "I - I'm sorry."_

_Atem hugged him. "For what? You've given me back my future, aibou. Don't be sorry for that."_

* * *

"And that - that was it. That's the only other time," Yuugi finished. Tony set his laptop back on the floor and rested his elbows on his knees. Then he stretched out for his messenger bag, unbuckled it, and riffled through its contents. His hand reappeared carrying a worn paperback. Yuugi watched as he checked the index, flipped to whatever section he found pertinent, read, swore, and closed the book with a snap. Then he ran his fingers over his eyes.

"Shit." Tony reached for his laptop. "Why the hell didn't you ever tell me what you were doing making all those damn birds, Yuugi?"

Yuugi worried at his lip. By the end of the day it was almost sure to be bleeding. "I thought - I thought maybe you'd stop me."

"Yeah, well, you and your maybe I'd stop you didn't have any fucking idea what you were doing. You opened a door between two worlds, and when you do that you gotta close it. If you don't, there's no telling what shit's going to come through before it closes on its own." He sighed and started typing. "On the bright side - if you can call it that - Pretty Girl's right. It's probably Egyptian in origin, and it's probably not strong enough to cross over on its own - without someone in the corporeal world opening a gate for it. It's nothing that actually has to be summoned - but it's possible that it can only possess someone within a very small radius of its entry point." Yuugi watched him type and hit Enter. "Call it just under three hundred on Brian, maybe a total of somewhere around five hundred once we add in what I don't have here." He tapped the laptop's screen.

"So now we start reading?" Anzu asked. Tony shook his head.

"You can if you want, but my eyes are shot. I think I'd rather call it a day. And I don't think you should take anything home." He shot a glance in Yuugi's direction. "It already knows you're a threat. We couldn't hide me being here, and it probably knows I'm a threat, too. Giving it ideas probably isn't the best thing to do if you want to live to see the weekend."

Yuugi and Anzu both nodded. Tony flipped the messenger bag back open.

"You. Pretty Girl."

Anzu looked up.

"What languages do you speak? Other than Japanese?"

Anzu looked startled. "I'm fluent in English . . . and I know a little Latin."

"Enough to read in?"

Anzu considered. "I can try."

Tony tossed her a book with a soft leather cover. "Read me something."

Anzu opened the book, picked a spot, and read. Tony stopped her after about a paragraph.

"Now tell me what you just read."

Anzu paused, considering. "It was part of a history on the origin of the pentagram."

Tony nodded. "Good." He turned his attention to Yuugi. "You?"

Yuugi shrugged apologetically. "Hieratic Egyptian. And English. Kind of."

Tony flicked his gaze back to Anzu. "How about your boyfriend?"

"The same as Yuugi. Only I don't think he's fluent in hieratic."

Tony sighed and began pawing through the bag. "Count us lucky I hate reading translations. Most of these are in English." He traded Anzu the book in her hand for a surprisingly small volume. "The Necronomicon. You up to some serious note-taking?"

Anzu nodded. Tony pulled out a package in brown paper and tossed it to Yuugi.

"Happy birthday. That one you can keep."

Yuugi pulled off the paper and found a green book with a very familiar carving depicted on the front.

"Naming the Unnamed Pharaoh: The Saqqara Project. This is about Atem, isn't it?" Yuugi started laughing. "Man, wait until he hears about this."

Tony nodded. "Thought you might like that. Check and make sure his hat size don't go up too much."

Yuugi couldn't help it - he snorted aloud. Then he checked the author's name. Antonio Perez.

"_You_ wrote this?"

"Yup."

"You wrote a _book_?"

Tony raised his eyebrows. "Where you been? I've written two books. And by the time we're done here you're probably gonna be sick of both of them." He shut down the laptop and slid it into his bag. "That's assuming we live through this."

* * *

Yuugi dragged a chair under the window and grabbed the bottle of alcohol. He sprayed, polished it dry with an old newspaper, and moved to a new section to begin again. A gust of rain-smelling wind blew into the shop, and Yuugi looked down to see Anzu standing by his knee with a dripping umbrella in her hand. He took off his headphones and let them hang around his neck.

"Hi!"

Anzu waved up at him. "Busy?"

Yuugi hoisted the spray bottle. "I'm finishing here and locking up. I'm starving."

"Ryou's got classes. Want to go eat?"

Yuugi scrubbed at a stubborn corner. "Only if you think you can deal with Atem and Tony at the same time. They're supposed to be picking me up in ten minutes, and I swear they just keep looking for excuses to kill each other. Well - Tony not so much, if you actually know him. I think Atem just doesn't know how to deal with socially inept people."

"That's fine." Anzu pulled out one of the chairs sitting around the tournament table near the front of the room and sat down. "I'm exhausted."

"Long night?" Yuugi offered her a sympathetic glance.

Anzu nodded. "I think someone might have been getting married. Really, Yuugi, why do so many guys think it's attractive to act like a pack of hungry monkeys?"

Yuugi shrugged. "Maybe they're genetic throwbacks." He dragged the chair to the table and hauled his cleaning supplies back into the closet. "You should take a night off."

Anzu shook her head. "I can't. Rent and telephone fall on the same week this month." She sighed as Yuugi locked the supply closet.

"Someday you're going to get to dance on a real stage, Anzu. And then everyone's going to think you're an absolute princess."

Anzu laughed. It was a tired sound. "Don't I wish."

The bell over the door tinkled. Yuugi looked up and smiled. He loved working at the shop, he really did, but there was something special about the days when someone came to take him to lunch.

"Hey, guys. We picked up a stray."

Atem nodded at Anzu in greeting while Yuugi grabbed his windbreaker. The weather had been fairly decent when Yuugi walked to work that morning - a few stray drops here and there - but by now the rain was pouring down the gutters and pounding the sidewalk in force.

"You didn't tell me you taught him how to drive, Fish." Tony jerked his head at Atem.

Yuugi grinned. "Oh, yeah. He got his license last year."

"I noticed. I was praying the whole way here we weren't going to turn a corner and go airborne."

Atem rolled his eyes and motioned toward the door. "You have your keys, aibou?"

Yuugi unclipped the carbine attached to his beltloop. "Right here."

"Then let's go."

In spite of Anzu's best efforts with the umbrella, all four of them were soaked by the time they made the car. Atem turned on the heater. Tony rolled down his window.

"If you want to be wet, I can let you out."

"Forgive me for thinking steamed-up windows only belong at drive-ins."

Yuugi and Anzu both collapsed in the backseat. Atem indulged them for a good twenty seconds before cutting in.

"If you don't mind, I'm trying to drive up here." They obliged, stifling their last few giggles. Atem sighed.

"All right, aibou, I give up."

"What?" Yuugi's eyes widened, not sure whether he should be amused or terrified. The last time he'd heard Atem say "I give up," he'd spent half the night trying to get close to a dozen Trojans and a worm off the computer.

"What's a drive-in?"

* * *

Lunch went fairly well, Anzu and Yuugi managing to keep a civil conversation running at least most of the time. Atem barely spoke to Tony, but Yuugi was too relieved by the lack of fighting to worry about it. It was at some point after getting soup but before getting actual food that Anzu glanced at her watch.

"I'm going to have to go in about fifteen minutes, just so you know. I - I kind of have an - errand to run."

Yuugi nodded. Atem glanced in her direction. "Want a lift?"

Anzu shook her head. "No, it's fine."

Yuugi silently blessed the waitress, who returned with their food at precisely that moment. It meant they didn't have to talk anymore. Anzu practically bolted her calamari before taking leave of them all.

"See you later, guys. Atem, would you grab my coat? Please?"

There was no answer. Yuugi nudged him. Atem glanced in Anzu's direction. Yuugi watched her eyes go wide. Tony's eyebrows nearly disappeared right into his hair. Yuugi slid an arm around Atem's back and grabbed Anzu's coat from the pile. He had a good idea what was going on, and didn't care to try snapping Atem out of it. The last time he'd done that, he'd ended up with a bruise right on his tailbone. It had taken nearly a week to heal.

He saw Atem blink out of the corner of his eye, and relaxed. It was usually a good sign. Atem shook his head.

"It's warm in here."

Tony nodded. "Not to be another one eating and running, but I got stuff to do this afternoon."

Yuugi started to get up - before their paths would diverge he could at least find out what Tony thought now that he'd seen Atem's _other _in person. Tony kicked his foot - hard - and he slid back, confused.

"_Adios_."

Atem snorted. Yuugi risked a glance at him. There was a flush high in his face that Yuugi didn't like.

"Atem?"

"I suppose we should get going too, aibou. You have a shop to run."

Yuugi was a little slow in matters of devious behavior, but not stupid. He didn't fail to notice the proprietary way Atem's arm slid around his waist as they walked out, and he had no doubt what it meant.

Yuugi groaned inwardly. _Why now?_

* * *

Yuugi knocked on the door. There was a pause, and then it opened.

"What the hell you doing here?"

"Thanks for being so enthusiastic." Yuugi sat down in the closest chair. "I wanted to ask you about - "

"You got somewhere to be tonight, Fish. And it's not here."

"Five minutes."

Tony sighed and sat back down on the bed. "Three."

"Why? I don't - "

"Because I'm not stupid, Fish. I still like my balls right where they are. And I get the feeling Atem is ready to twist them right off."

Yuugi sighed. "I was hoping that was just my imagination."

"Not your imagination. Two minutes."

Yuugi didn't argue further. "You saw it this afternoon, didn't you? The other one?"

Tony nodded. "If you came here to ask me what I think, I think it's getting stronger. And I think we're in even deeper shit than I thought before. Because whatever it is, it has a mind of its own, and it knows how to use it. It recognized Pretty Girl, and it recognized me. If it can access his memories, we might end up killing him to keep it from getting out."

Yuugi was on his feet in an instant. "No."

Tony shrugged. "Then don't get it mad. Buy us some time, Yuugi. You can do that. Keep him happy. Go home."

"But what about - "

"You got any other friends who can keep their mouths shut?"

Yuugi hesitated. "If Jounouchi and Honda knew I was serious when I said it was our lives on the line . . . "

"Pretty Girl has their numbers?"

Yuugi nodded. "But I can call them up tonight and - "

"No."

Yuugi stared.

"You got something really good here, Yuugi. You got a good job, you got a home, you got a man who loves you. And right now you're about a whore's hair from losing it all. Tonight you go home, you put in a movie, you make dinner, you play a game, whatever the hell it is you two do when you're alone and not having sex. And you let me do the worrying. That's what I came here for - not to steal you away from him. Right now you still _have_ a partner. Your job is to hold on to him. My job is to make sure you keep having something to hold on to." Tony nodded toward the door. "Now go home."

Yuugi nodded. The mark of a true gamer - knowing when it's time to quit playing.

"Should I still come by Anzu's tomorrow?"

Tony shook his head. "Take a couple days off, Fish. I'll have her call you when I want you."

* * *

"Aibou."

Yuugi's eyes fluttered and were still.

"Yuugi."

Yuugi let out a slurred kind of half-sleeping moan and nuzzled closer to the body half-under him.

"Aibou, I need to get up."

Yuugi whined and rolled over. Atem snagged his waist just before he went over the side of the sofa. His fingers dug into Yuugi's side, and Yuugi came awake at once.

"Ouch!"

Atem pulled him back onto the sofa. "I'm sorry, aibou." He kissed his fingers and touched Yuugi's side. "But you were going to fall."

Yuugi sat up unsteadily. Late afternoon sun spilled through the patio door. Atem smiled at him.

"Feel better?"

"Nnnnnn." Yuugi rubbed the side of his face with his hand. They'd been watching a movie on television, some really stupid American thing about cowboys . . .

_I need to start napping when he's at work, or something. I can't keep doing this._

"A gold piece for your thoughts."

"Oh – nothing. I just . . . " Yuugi hoped his smile looked right. Sheepish, still a little sleep-fuzzed. "You're too comfy, you know that?"

Atem raised an eyebrow. "Oh, really?"

Yuugi leaned against his shoulder. "Uh-huh." Under no circumstances – unless Tony told him there was no other way – was he going to tell Atem about the murderous _other_ living inside him. Yuugi knew what would happen if he said something - he would come home and find a cold body on the floor, and maybe a note saying it was the only thing to be done. Yuugi wasn't going to let that happen.

Atem sighed and stood up, stretching and letting his spine crackle. Yuugi nearly smiled with one thought. The following thought immediately wiped it away. When Atem stretched that way, he looked remarkably like Tony – and likely would stay with Jii-chan tonight if Yuugi so much as let on to the resemblance. Yuugi got to his feet and wrapped his arms around Atem's waist.

"When are you getting off tonight?" He breathed in the scent of dust and cinnamon, Atem personified. Atem twisted in his arms so they were face to face.

"Eleven at the earliest." He looked pained. "I have to run an inventory sheet tonight."

Yuugi offered him a smile. "Want help?" He half-hoped Atem would say yes. He could go in at ten when the shop closed, and with two of them counting they could be out by ten-thirty. Maybe they could stop at a café on the way back to the apartment and have a cup of tea, and then -

Yuugi felt a sudden, loathsome change in the arms around him. No, there would be no tea or lovemaking tonight. He let his feet move without protest as it pushed him away, a flat glare in dark, hateful eyes.

"I'm fine."

Yuugi nodded, pretending as always that there was nothing wrong, that he hadn't been thinking of their evening only moments ago. He didn't bother trying to hide the hurt, even though he knew the _other_ surely relished it – if it believed he was ignorant, all the better.

"I'll leave something out for you. In case you're hungry when you get back," he murmured. The _other_ didn't acknowledge him. It reached the door, and then turned around. Yuugi felt his skin go cold, and then he was pulling himself off the floor and the apartment was empty. A warm trickle ran down his cheek. He raised his hand to wipe away tears. His fingers came away red.

Five minutes in the bathroom convinced him he should be all right; it was little more than a scratch, really, and he thought he even knew what had caused it – the ring Atem wore on the third finger of his right hand. If he'd been backhanded, it would explain the marks on his face perfectly.

Or would have, if Atem had been right-handed – and hadn't been standing eight feet away from him.

Yuugi pressed a cold washcloth carefully to the cut. It was already swelling. Suddenly it was too much. He couldn't do it anymore. He couldn't do it, and so he retreated to the bedroom and curled up under the covers, letting them fall as far up his face as they liked. He grabbed Atem's pillow and buried his face in it.

He was sitting up in an instant when the hand fell on his shoulder. Had Anzu not been gifted with incredible reflexes, she likely would have had a bruise to match Yuugi's own. Yuugi wasn't known for hitting hard, but the copper-wire bracelet on his wrist added a fair amount of heft to even his lightest swing. Yuugi stared at her, disbelieving, and then started to cry. Anzu sat down next to him and wrapped her arms around him.

"You can't keep doing this, Yuugi," she whispered. He didn't answer. He didn't need to. Anzu ran her fingers gently through his hair. At last he quieted and reached for the cloth he'd held to the cut beneath his eye. Anzu waited patiently while Yuugi washed his face.

"Um – do you – do you want something to drink?" Yuugi swung his legs off the bed. Anzu stood and then pulled him to his feet.

"I think you're the one who needs a drink," she told him, and after leading him into the kitchen, she proceeded to search for whatever spirits might be kept there. She uncovered only a bottle of table wine and a bottle of vodka. Yuugi motioned for the second bottle.

"Anzu, can you give me that?"

Anyone else might have raised their eyebrows; Yuugi was far from being any kind of heavy drinker. Anzu suspected he'd take one swig and knock himself out, but handed it over without comment. Yuugi grabbed a paper towel and held it to the mouth of the bottle, then tipped it. He held the vodka-soaked patch of paper towel to the cut below his eye, then hissed in pain.

"You need to tell Tony something for me."

Anzu popped the cork on the table wine and poured out half a wineglass each, then handed Yuugi one of them and sat down. Yuugi held his glass, but didn't drink.

"It's getting stronger."

"What is?" Anzu winced in sympathy as Yuugi shifted the paper towel and a small, bloody smear came into view.

"You know what, Anzu." Yuugi eyed the glass in his hand, set it down, and displayed his face. "He never touched me." He shook his head as Anzu's mouth opened in protest. "I'm serious. He was standing by the door. I was by the sofa. And then I was on the floor. He never touched me."

Anzu's breath left her in a rush. "Yuugi, I think you should come over tonight. You can stay in my room if you want. I'm working."

Yuugi shook his head. Had he really been thinking about pulling Atem into the bedroom after work only an hour before? It seemed impossible. Tonight he'd likely be curled up on one side of the mattress, Atem on the other, and a vast sea of sheets between them.

"I can't just run out on him."

* * *

The boy sighed and rolled over, the boneless movements of complete relaxation. He'd had to go into the shop when the vessel had called him - the computer, apparently, had decided to freeze for no good reason, and the vessel had never had to use a printed inventory sheet. And the boy had decided the night wasn't totally unsalvageable after all. Now he was sleeping, and deeply. It looked at him with hateful satisfaction and shifted its grip. It stepped closer to the bed. A board creaked beneath the rug on the boy's side of the bed. It sounded somehow sly, the cackle of a hag invading the space the boy and the vessel had made their own.

Yuugi's eyes snapped open, and he rolled out of the way just as the knife came down where his shoulder had been only moments before. He pulled himself up onto his hands and knees on Atem's side of the bed, then scrambled down off it. The _other_ hissed at him and lunged. Yuugi swung his arm blindly. Metal clicked against metal, and he heard a solid thud. Then he was on his knees at Atem's side, running his fingers through tangled hair and looking for blood where Atem's head had struck the bedpost. Atem's eyes opened, searched, focused.

"Yuugi?" He looked down at his own hand, the fingers still curled around the knife handle. His eyes widened.

"Aibou . . . "

Yuugi buried his face in Atem's shoulder. "Don't worry about it," he mumbled. Atem dropped the knife, ran his fingers into Yuugi's hair, cuddled him. Then he pulled back and touched Yuugi's face, just below his eye. Even in the chancy nighttime light coming through the bedroom window, there could be no mistaking the discoloration of his face now he'd washed it for bed. Yuugi had been struck. Atem cast a horrified glance at the knife sitting next to them.

And suddenly the pieces clicked. The lapses of time, usually only two or three minutes long but sometimes lasting for hours . . . all the times he'd woken up with Yuugi curled on the far side of the mattress instead of snuggled against his side . . . Yuugi's sudden spate of disappearances, staying for hours at Anzu's instead of coming home . . .

_I'm not_ going _insane_, he thought. _I've already gone, and I'm hurting him._

"Yuugi – "

Yuugi grabbed Atem's arms before he could even attempt to slip away. "No."

"Aibou . . . "

He saw tears on Yuugi's face. "It's going to be okay, Atem. Just trust me. Please."

Atem shook his head. "Aibou, you're – "

Yuugi dropped himself into Atem's lap. "You're not leaving, and you're not doing anything stupid. So don't talk about it."

Atem closed his eyes and sighed. "How long?"

"What do you mean, how long?" Yuugi curled closer. The _other_ had retreated, and was no doubt sulking because Yuugi had managed to keep Atem from grabbing the knife by his side and using it on his own throat. Atem touched his cheek.

"I mean how long, aibou. It's not a hard question."

"I – I figured it out about a week ago," Yuugi lied, hoping the tremble in his voice would be put down to adrenaline rush. Atem nodded wearily. In the light from the streetlamp, he looked incredibly old. Yuugi got up and pulled Atem to his feet.

"Come on. You need to sleep."

Atem's eyes opened, and Yuugi was frightened by what he saw in them. Never before – even in their most intimate moments – had he ever seen Atem without fire in his eyes. It was, he thought, just as bad as watching him go through the door into the afterlife, the door Yuugi had managed to force open just long enough to –

He forced the thought away. If the _other_ could hear his thoughts the way Atem could – and he had no way to rule it out – he didn't want it to know what Tony had told him.

Yuugi led Atem back to the bed, then curled up next to him. He left the knife where it was; he always got up before Atem on days when they both worked, and it would be a simple matter of picking it up in the morning before putting on tea.

"Atem?"

Yuugi waited. There was no answer. He leaned over and kissed Atem's cheek.

"Aishiteru."

He felt the _other_ pulling away in revulsion, and wished fervently for morning to come.

* * *

Yuugi rubbed his eyes. He hated tournament days, especially when Atem wasn't working. Honda was working a half-day to help them out, but since he didn't play Duel Monsters, he couldn't do much but run the register. Already today Yuugi'd had to confiscate four illegal cards from kids who hadn't bothered to keep up on which cards were being released and retired. He glanced at the clock, then cupped his hands around his mouth.

"Okay, duelists! Put down your hands! Player with the most Life Points wins!"

The remaining players – not many now, the last match had consisted of only four pairs - shuffled about, ready to kibitz as the winners faced off against each other. Yuugi counted them off and matched them up.

"Duel time is fifteen minutes! At the end of that time, player with the most Life Points wins. Three illegal moves will be cause for your disqualification. And watchers, no giving advice. This is a silent duel." He glanced at the clock again. "Game start!"

The bell over the door tinkled. Yuugi nodded in its general direction before laying his hand down on a duel table.

"You can't attack on the same turn you play a card," he said, and the boy sitting there wrinkled his nose before withdrawing the attack. Yuugi had never seen him before, and suspected he was new to the game.

"You busy, Fish?"

Yuugi jumped and turned as a hand landed on his shoulder. Tony's eyes were serious.

"Someplace we can talk?"

Yuugi cast a glance at the watchers and duelists. They were absorbed, paying no attention whatsoever to the man who had just walked into their midst. Yuugi nodded at Honda.

"Honda, can you keep an eye on them for a minute?"

Honda nodded. Yuugi pulled Tony into the storage room.

"Okay, what's going on? You don't call me for a week, and then – "

"How soon can you get out of here?"

Yuugi gaped.

"I wouldn't ask if it wasn't important, Fish. You know that."

Yuugi shrugged, shook his head, and finally conceded defeat.

"The tournament's over at four. I'm supposed to go home at five, but Jii-chan can probably handle it all right without me if I need to leave early."

"You need to."

Yuugi shrugged. "Fine. Are you going to tell me what's going on?"

Tony shook his head. "I hate repeating myself too. You can wait half an hour." He checked his watch. "I have to go. Got things to do before tonight. I'll see you at Pretty Girl's." He vanished back through the curtain into the front room, and was out the door before Yuugi could follow.

* * *

Yuugi managed to reach the complex at five after four. He'd had to run the entire way, and he massaged the stitch in his side as he got on the lift. Anzu met him as soon as he stepped into the sixth-floor hallway. She hugged him tightly before leading him down the hall to the flat. Tony raised a hand in greeting. Yuugi nodded at him, and then caught sight of Honda sitting next to Jounouchi in the window seat.

"Honda!"

Tony waved a hand airily. Yuugi found it not at all difficult to imagine that hand covered in gold ornaments. "You're a bit out of the loop, Fish. I wanted it that way. Sit down."

Yuugi sat, and then did another double-take. Sitting next to Tony was a tall blonde man he dimly remembered from a long-ago Christmas party. Tony was holding his hand so tightly Yuugi suspected there would be marks in the morning. Tony laughed. It was strained.

"He came in last night. You remember Alexei, right, Fish?"

Yuugi nodded. Yes – Alexei. The boyfriend who'd worked on Stephanie's dig. Anzu sat down next to Yuugi and took his hand in both of hers. Yuugi struggled to not pull his hands away. It was like they'd been plunged into a bucket of ice.

"We all here?" Tony asked, and then looked around, doing a silent headcount. He nodded, apparently satisfied.

"I think I better start by telling you people I'm not going to hold it against you if you decide you don't want to go through with this, because there's a good chance we're all gonna die tonight."

Yuugi's eyes went wide. Anzu's hands clamped down on his.

"I'm not leaving," she said. Tony's eyes drifted to her, and he smiled. It was tired, strained, but genuine. He glanced around the room. Jounouchi and Honda cast their eyes toward Yuugi and held up their right hands. Yuugi smiled, reminiscent and a little sad. All these years later, they were still bound by that silly smiley-face Anzu had once scrawled over the backs of their fingers. Ryou reached for Anzu's hand.

"I guess we're your men. And women," he added. Alexei squeezed Tony's hand. Tony squeezed back.

"Then we have – " he glanced at the clock – "about forty-five minutes to get through everything and get sorted out. Pretty Girl said her roomies are out for the night. That's helpful." He stretched his legs.

"First I should tell you we have three options here. I think only one of them's really viable. One, we can do nothing – Ryou can take Yuugi home right now – and we can start planning Atem's funeral." He saw Yuugi open his mouth furiously, and raised a hand to stall him. "We can wait to do something, and we'll probably all die because this ugly motherfucker is already too fucking strong. Or we can do something tonight. And the odds are good that we might not get out alive. And he might not, either."

"Tonight," Jounouchi and Honda said together. Anzu and Ryou both nodded. Yuugi bit his lip and looked down.

"Fish? It's up to you."

Yuugi shook his head. "I don't want anyone to get hurt." He looked up, and for a moment all of them were reminded of the lost, lonely Yuugi who had traveled to Egypt almost three years before. His eyes were wavering behind thick blankets of tears. "There has to be some other way."

Tony slid off the table he was sitting on and sat down in front of Yuugi, legs tucked neatly beneath him. He laid one hand on top of Yuugi's and Anzu's.

"Listen to me, Yuugi," he said, and Yuugi bit his lip. He'd heard that tone before. The night Jii-chan had his heart attack. He could feel a sob attack just trying to happen, and bit it back. They didn't have time for him to have hysterics. Tony squeezed his hand.

"I know what it's like to lose someone you're close to, and I know what it's like to realize there wasn't a single damn thing you could do about it no matter how hard you tried. I'm trying to give you the chance to fix things, but I'm not going to lie and say it's going to be easy or that everything's going to be okay. I can't say that for sure. All I can say is that we can do something and maybe survive, or we can do nothing and probably all die. If this motherfucker kills him – "

"It'll take him over, won't it?" Yuugi asked. "It'd just take his body and use it however it wanted."

Tony nodded. "I think it would."

Yuugi took a deep breath to steady himself and looked around their little group. "Okay, then. All right. What are we doing?"

Tony got to his feet. "I stayed up until five in the morning going back over everything. I think at this point there's no time to bullshit around with fancy rituals we can't complete properly to begin with. So we're going to do a little cross-religious exorcism." His eyes glanced around the group. "I don't suppose any of you are Catholic, are you?"

Jounouchi, Honda, and Ryou shook their heads. Alexei raised his hand, and Tony waved him off.

"Not you. I need you for something else." He sighed. "Somehow I knew this was going to – "

"My father is," Anzu cut in, and Tony turned to her. "I'm not, but I've been to church a lot when I was little."

"That works," Tony said. "How much of the Mass do you know?"

Anzu shrugged. "The Kyrie . . . and I know the standard prayers. You know, the Hail Mary and the Our Father." She blushed. "That's about it. I never really paid attention."

"Good enough. Do you know the recitation for exorcism?"

Anzu shook her head. Tony recited something to her. Yuugi barely noticed. He was focusing on the clock. There was something, something wrong, he could feel it . . .

"Tony."

"I – I'm not sure I can remember that," Anzu admitted, and Tony grabbed his notebook.

"I'll write it down."

"Tony."

Jounouchi cast a glance in Yuugi's direction. "What's up, man?"

"_Tony_!"

Tony looked up. Yuugi was pale.

"He's at the shop."

Tony's eyes went wide. His notebook hit the floor as he cursed. "What do you mean, at the shop?"

Yuugi closed his eyes and pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes. "He came to pick me up," he said, rapping the words out quickly. The link was dim, blurry. "He wanted to take me to dinner." Yuugi looked up, horrified. "Jii-chan told him you were there."

"_Fuck_," Tony swore. "All right, we got to speed this up. No time. Mister Mario Brothers, you're in front of the windows." Jounouchi and Honda didn't ask questions; they simply stood up and headed for the two windows in Anzu's living room, one to each. "Ryou, you're going to be the hallway. Alexei . . . the front door."

"What about me?" Anzu asked, and Tony turned to her.

"Shit. I was hoping I could keep you out of this." He looked around, then pointed at the doors to the balcony. "You're going to stand there. Yuugi, you're next to me, and when he comes in, you get out of the way. I don't care if you have to shove me the fuck over, just get out of his direct line of sight."

Yuugi opened his mouth to protest. Tony cut him off.

"We don't have time. Is it trying to take over?"

Yuugi tried to focus. Atem's mind was no longer with his, a warm and gentle and everpresent touch. He could feel its presence, but it was hazy and fuzzed out.

"It already did." He could feel tears starting deep in his chest and willed them away. The time for tears was over. Now they would just have to trust – trust Tony, trust the gods, trust whoever was supposed to help them now.

"Fuck." Tony focused on Anzu again. "I'm going to start reciting from – you probably know it as the Book of the Dead. And when it tries to back away, you're going to start in with the litany I just gave you. Just keep going with it. Throw in some Aves wherever you feel like it. I don't suppose you know it in Latin."

Anzu nodded. "That's where I learned it from."

Tony nodded. Under less pressured circumstances, Yuugi thought he might have smiled. "Good. Throw in some Aves, throw in a couple of Kyries. And don't stop." He cast a glance around. "And I want this to be very clear to all of you – especially you." His eyes darted between Yuugi and Alexei. "If anybody goes down - _anybody_ - you don't stop what you're doing, and Yuugi, you don't break cover. Your priorities – " he pointed to Ryou, Honda, and Jounouchi – "are to keep Pretty Girl alive and standing, and to keep him from getting out. Yuugi, you just focus on staying alive. Let him believe you think we're expendable – he'll be less likely to go after someone you're not too beshitted about. And if I'm the one who goes down, Alexei takes over for me." He looked at them all one more time.

"Just in case I don't get the chance to say this again . . . it's been a pleasure working with you all."

They cast last glances between each other, trying to say all the important things in only a few seconds.

Yuugi bit his lip. Then he felt something in his head, a sharp pain like a slap.

"He's coming."

Tony nodded, his eyes still fixed on the door. "Okay."

"He's angry."

Tony nodded again. "I figured." He turned around. "You trust me, right?"

Yuugi nodded.

"Even when I act completely batshit insane?"

Yuugi felt his lips try to smile. It was as though they belonged to a total stranger. "Yeah."

"Then tell me when he's in the hallway."

Yuugi nodded. His entire body felt somehow numb. The presence in his head was red, furious, a swarm of bees ready to kill.

"He's on the lift."

"Get up here." Tony pointed to the space next to him, and Yuugi obeyed. His lungs were trying to stop. He didn't let them.

"He's here."

A key clicked in the lock. Tony grabbed Yuugi's arm.

Time stopped. Each individual second seemed to have weight as the door swung open and Tony pressed his lips to Yuugi's forehead. Yuugi heard a roar not at all human, and slid through Tony's relaxing grip. Tony began to speak. From somewhere behind him, Yuugi could hear Anzu reciting the Aves. Alexei slammed the door and stood in front of it.

And then Yuugi realized he had nowhere to go. He heard a cry in a thick and unfamiliar accent, and a thud. Tony hit the floor on one shoulder and rolled to his feet. Blood welled, then spilled down his cheek. Yuugi looked for something to dive behind.

"Anzu, the litany!"

"In the name of the – in – I don't remember!" Anzu wailed as Yuugi slid behind the sofa. He heard Alexei's voice somewhere a thousand miles away as he took a look around. One chance – only one.

"Somebody get the coffee table out of the way!"

He saw Ryou run from his place and yank it out of the middle of the floor just as the _other_ found its way around the sofa and lunged for him. Yuugi reached up, grabbed the back of the sofa, and vaulted over it.

And then the _other_ was on him, breath hot and angry in his face. Yuugi hooked a leg behind its knees and threw his weight. They hit the floor. If he could just keep it pinned -

The _other _mimicked him, threw its weight furiously to the side. Yuugi's head slammed against the wooden floor.

And suddenly he understood.

_It doesn't care what it has to do. It just wants rid of me._

"Hey, demon! You lose."

Atem's face twisted in a snarl. Yuugi watched the flat red eyes practically steam with anger. His hand plunged into the front of his shirt and wound around a thin leather cord.

"I don't care what you do. I still love him, and he's still _mine_."

The _other_ realized a moment too late what Yuugi had gone for. He felt teeth click only centimeters from his throat.

_It's got to be now._

He yanked his piece of the Millennium Puzzle free of his shirt and slammed it against Atem's chest.

And then he was in the dark, running, running for both of their lives.

* * *

Atem's soul room had changed. No longer full of false, lying doors and impossible staircases, it had become a long, dark corridor ending in a wide, open space. The things that had existed there – a picture of himself and Atem, several of their friends, a replica of the chess set he'd made Atem for Christmas – had been scattered and smashed. And against the far wall, he could see a small figure huddled.

"Atem!"

The figure looked up. Yuugi raced to it, dropped to his knees, embraced it. He could feel Atem's hand warm on his back, and something long and cold and hateful beneath it.

"Get away, aibou," he said, and his eyes were regretful. "It's too late."

Yuugi cast his eyes downward. Atem was shackled to the wall, a prisoner in his own mind. Yuugi shook his head.

"No."

"Yuugi, please. Don't stay here."

"I'm not leaving you!"

"Aibou, you have to - _watch out!_"

Yuugi was on his feet and turned around in an instant. He couldn't get the proper measure of the thing that slapped a flexible, spiny tail at him. He only knew a harsh snap and an instant of white-hot pain in his wrist as something clattered noisily to the floor, and then he was dodging, trying to get face to face with the hateful thing that had entered Atem's body unbidden and taken him prisoner.

* * *

Anzu was the first to reach Yuugi's body, lying still on the floor with Atem sprawled over him. She looked up at Tony, horrified.

"He took the battle inside."

Tony cursed, then began chanting again as the others abandoned their places to cluster around. All of them heard the sharp snap and clatter as Yuugi's wrist did something it shouldn't. His fingers, supported now only by the collar of Atem's shirt, began to slip.

"Oh, no you don't," Jounouchi hissed, and he and Honda both dove for the precious gold piece at the same time. Anzu shrieked as Jounouchi landed in her lap, limp and unresisting. Then she put her hands on Atem's shoulders and continued her prayers obediently.

The gold piece was still pressed to Atem's collarbone.

* * *

Yuugi saw movement out of the corner of his eye and tried to not moan as he realized he'd done it again; his friends were in danger, and it was his fault.

_And this one's so big it took you three years to make it happen!_

No. No. He wouldn't let himself think that way. He dodged again – the wrong way – and then a hand wrapped around his arm. Jounouchi yanked him backward and out of the way.

"Honda, get Atem!"

Honda ducked under the tail – having circled the demon once, Yuugi thought it looked something like a cross between a scorpion and some kind of vicious spider – and then behind it. Atem stared at him, the wide eyes of the damned. Honda dropped down next to him and set immediately to his task.

"Shit . . . " There had to be a way to pick the locks. Had to be. He cast his hand around behind him and encountered something heavy and metal and still warm from Yuugi's skin.

Yes. The bracelet, the bracelet Atem had given Yuugi two years ago, when Yuugi had given him the ring he wore on his right hand even now. It was called a slave bracelet. Yuugi had made it incredibly clear that he was nobody's slave, but had continued wearing it anyway on an almost constant basis. And this particular bracelet was made of wrapped copper wire.

"Sorry, Yuugi," Honda whispered. He scrabbled at the solder with his fingernails. The wire held, then loosened.

And finally it broke free.

* * *

Tony laid his hands on top of Anzu's. His frantic chanting had long since subsided into subdued but constant mutters. Alexei put a hand on his back.

"He'll be all right, love," he said, and Tony shook his head.

"I hope so, _solo mio_," he murmured. "Come on, Yuugi. We're still pulling for you."

* * *

Honda snapped a piece of wire off the bracelet and bent it. Behind him he could hear Jounouchi and Yuugi still dodging the ugly black thing that had invaded Atem's mind. If it wore them out before he could finish . . .

"I hope Jounouchi was right about this," he muttered, and slid the wire into one of the locks.

It clicked.

* * *

Yuugi brushed his fringe out of his eyes. Already he was growing tired; not a good sign.

_What I really need is something to fight with,_ he thought. _Something I can use my left hand for._ He was still entirely unaware of the extent of the damage to his wrist; he only knew that it throbbed horribly every time he moved, and he couldn't make it do what he wanted it to do.

_If I don't find something, I think we're dead._ He reached for a piece of torn gold – part of the frame that had once held a picture of a dancing Anzu – and wrapped his fingers around it. They clenched on thin air. He dived for a piece of glass and watched it shimmer out of sight under his fingers.

* * *

"He doesn't have anything left to fight with," Anzu moaned fretfully. She didn't share the kind of telepathic link Yuugi and Atem had re-forged, but she'd been Yuugi's best friend for well over fifteen years. She could tell when something was wrong with him.

Tony went rigid. Then he reached for Yuugi's good hand.

"All right, people, all I'm asking is a little help for the kid, okay?" He wrapped his fingers around Yuugi's loosely curled fist and reached for something that had fallen from his long-overturned messenger bag.

"Come on, Fish. I think I got something for you."

* * *

Yuugi felt something cold and not quite cylindrical appear in his hand. He didn't even have to look at it to know what it was. It was the knife that had tasted his blood in the temple of Atum, the one that had resurrected Atem once. Maybe it could help him again.

There was a cry as Jounouchi was slapped with the thing's tail at last. He hit the ground squarely and grunted in pain. Yuugi backed up. He wanted room to dive.

"Hey! Hey, you!"

The _other_ paid him no attention. Yuugi took a deep breath. When all else failed, he'd put his trust in the person who'd led him here in the first place.

"Hey, motherfucker!"

At last its attention was on him. _Have I ever used that word before? I don't think I have_, he had time to think, a crazy kind of giddiness settling over him. Then it charged.

* * *

Anzu recoiled. Her hands stayed firm even as a wave of cold washed over her, but she wasn't sure how long she could hold on.

"He needs help . . . "

Ryou's hands descended on her shoulders, then slid down to her waist and around. Anzu leaned against him.

"Hurry it up, already," she moaned quietly. She would stay till she dropped – far be it from her to abandon her best friend to his fate - but she suspected it wouldn't take long.

* * *

Yuugi waited. It was almost on him. He dived forward, rolled, and thrust the knife forward, both hands wrapped firmly around the handle. He felt the bones in his right wrist grind together and suppressed a scream. He wouldn't give it the final pleasure of knowing it had given him pain. Its time was done.

He heard a horrible squealing noise as his hands plunged into the hole left by the knife in the thing's soft underbelly. Something hot ran over his hands, and he fought the urge to recoil as the _other_ writhed above him. It tottered, a heavy mass trying to drag him with it. He yanked the knife back and stabbed again. He had the distinct impression that if he looked at his hands, he would find them covered in blisters.

The _other_ fell. Yuugi pulled himself upright, panting.

"Go on, then," he said. "Go back to whatever hell you came from, and stay there."

It vanished.

* * *

Atem stood. His legs immediately tried to buckle, and Honda wrapped an arm around his waist to keep him upright. Jounouchi was running.

"Yuugi!"

Yuugi was on his knees, cradling his wrist and rocking in pain. When Jounouchi called him, he darted to his feet as though burnt.

"It's gone, man. You did it." Jounouchi clapped him on the shoulder, being careful to not jar his wrist. Yuugi nodded dumbly, his eyes going right past Jounouchi to the men standing most of the way across the room. Honda waved at him, and he stumbled to join them.

Atem reached for his hand. Jounouchi waved at Honda behind Yuugi's head and motioned toward the hallway. Honda hesitated, then pulled away. Atem seemed to be standing fine on his own. From somewhere a billion miles away, Yuugi could hear footsteps pattering away down the hallway.

* * *

Anzu nearly screamed when Jounouchi's head moved in her lap. She'd been concentrating so hard on Yuugi she'd forgotten he was there. He sat up unsteadily.

"It's gone. He killed it."

Tony's hand shot out and grabbed Jounouchi's shoulder as Honda rolled away and shook himself awake.

"Where are they, then?"

Jounouchi shook his head and shrugged. "We left them standing in the soul room. I think they're okay."

* * *

Atem brushed Yuugi's hair out of his eyes. Yuugi looked up at him for several seconds before throwing himself forward into a waiting pair of arms. The tears threatened to start again, and this time he let them fall.

"I-I-I thought I w-was going to l-lose you . . . "

"Hush, aibou. I'm here."

Yuugi pressed the side of his face against Atem's neck and breathed in. Even in the soul room he smelled of cinnamon and dust.

"We need to get back to the others, Yuugi."

Yuugi nodded, but made no move to leave.

"You have to go first."

"I don't want to leave you . . . "

Atem raised his hand and turned Yuugi's face so they were eye-to-eye. "Aibou, I promise you I'll be the first thing you see when you open your eyes." He kissed Yuugi's forehead. "Now let's get you out of here."

Yuugi allowed Atem to lead him into the long hallway, no longer as dark. Then a horrible thought hit him.

"Atem, what's going to happen in here? To your soul room?"

Atem shrugged. "I imagine it'll rebuild itself. Look." He pointed back into the room. Already the shackles had disappeared from the wall, and the broken chess pieces, though scattered, were now whole.

"Let's leave this place, aibou." He pointed to the square of light at the end of the hallway. "That's where you must go."

* * *

Atem rolled over and sat up, completely disoriented. Then there was a knife against his throat. The voice in his ear was cold.

"Where is he?"

"W-what?" The room was slightly grey. He wished he could lean his head against his knees; he thought he might pass out.

"He ain't waking up, damn it. Where is he?"

Atem blinked to try and clear his vision. Across from him he could see Anzu. She looked terrified.

"I – I think it's him, Tony. He's okay."

"I don't give a shit if it's him. I want to know where the other one is." The knife tilted, and now Atem could feel the flat of the blade. He wasn't in any immediate danger unless –

Then he saw the limp body next to him.

"Aibou!"

Had Tony not turned the knife when he had, Yuugi would likely have been partnerless in spite of his success. As it was, Atem came dangerously close to getting his throat slit as he broke out of Tony's arms.

"Aibou . . . " His eyes glanced up at Anzu and Ryou helplessly. "He was supposed to be back first. I watched him go." He pulled Yuugi up against his chest. "Aibou, wake up."

Yuugi's head turned bonelessly to the side. Atem curled close to him.

"Please, Yuugi." He brushed his fingers through Yuugi's fringe. "You need to wake up."

The eyes that met Tony's were haunted, guilty. Ryou put an arm around Anzu's shoulders. Jounouchi and Honda exchanged a glance and cast their eyes downward as Alexei caressed Tony's shoulder.

And then there was the least sound of a whimper from Yuugi's lips. He shifted in Atem's arms.

"Yuugi!" Anzu pulled away from Ryou and laid a hand on Yuugi's leg. His eyes opened, and she smiled.

"You're alive."

"Am I?" Yuugi raised his hand to brush his fringe out of his eyes and let out a cry. Atem caught his arm before he could lower it. Tony scooted forward to examine Yuugi's wrist, then whistled.

"You can't do anything halfway, can you, Fish?" He took a quick look around, then grabbed the bottom of Yuugi's shirt and tore it.

"Hey!"

"That's the same damn shirt you wore coming into Egypt when I met you. I'm surprised it still fits. You'll get over it." He wrapped Yuugi's wrist tightly, snagged a safety pin off the side of his messenger bag, and pinned the fabric to itself. "Need to get you to the hospital, Fish. I can't set bones."

"I'll get the car keys," Anzu said, darting down the hall toward her bedroom.

Yuugi let Ryou pull him to his feet. "You mean there's something you can't do?" Atem's arm wound around his waist. Tony snorted.

"What the hell, Fish. I flunked high school algebra three times."

* * *

Yuugi stirred the mess in the pan carefully. It smelled all right, but he didn't want it to burn.

The front door opened, then shut.

"Aibou!"

Yuugi smiled. "In the kitchen." He turned his head to kiss Atem hello without ever breaking stride. Atem slid an arm around his waist.

"You're late. Problem with the computer again?"

Atem shook his head. "I had to stop to check on your ring."

Yuugi sighed. "You know, I wish they'd been able to put the bracelet back together. I kind of liked that thing."

"The metal was snapped, aibou."

"I know, but . . . " Yuugi sighed. "At least I've still got the important part."

"Actually, about that."

"Hmm?"

"This is yours."

Yuugi felt something slide over his left wrist.

"Will you be mine, aibou?"

Yuugi smiled. "Is one 'yes' not enough?"

The chain of the bracelet clinked as Atem slid the ring over his finger.

"I suppose you'll have to wear it on this hand for awhile."

Yuugi lifted his hand to look at the bracelet on his wrist.

"We better hope Honda never has to use it as a pick again." The new bracelet was engraved silver – no wire in sight. He leaned back and pressed his hand to the back of Atem's neck.

"Aren't you the one who said no sex in the kitchen, aibou?"

"We have people coming over in twenty minutes. Be quiet and kiss me."

Atem chuckled and complied. "Aren't you the bossy one today."

"I'm the one who's been standing over this stupid stove since seven this morning. I think I deserve to be a little bossy."

Atem rubbed Yuugi's shoulders. "I'll forgive you this time."

"Forgive me, right. I say we're even after that mess you made of the dishwasher."

"But aibou, you were the one who poured the soap without checking the label."

Yuugi batted at him playfully. "Do me a favor, love. Set the table."

* * *

"Okay, and this is . . . I'm not sure exactly what it is, I got the recipe online. It's some kind of rice. But I tried it in the kitchen and it tastes fantastic."

Tony snorted. "Didn't anybody ever tell you you're not supposed to cook that way, Fish?"

"Well, it looks like something I had when I was in Egypt, but I'm pretty sure it's not Arabic."

Tony glanced into the pan. "That's because it's Spanish." He ladled some of the rice onto his plate and passed the dish to Ryou.

Yuugi sat down and reached for a bottle. "Okay, guys, pass me your glasses." Jounouchi shook his head as Ryou, Honda, and Anzu passed their glasses down. Yuugi filled them with wine, then passed them back. He poured his own glass, then reached for a second bottle. "Jounouchi, Tony, this belongs to you guys." He paused. "And Atem."

Anzu swirled the wine in her glass thoughtfully. "You know, I never understood why you don't drink normal wine, Atem. I mean, in school we learned about how even little kids drank wine in most ancient cultures."

Atem accepted his glass back from Yuugi. "I imagine your teachers never told you the wine I grew up on wasn't nearly so strong. I'd rather stay in full possession of my faculties, thank you."

"I hear that." Tony eyed the glass Yuugi handed back to him. "You sure this is nonalcoholic?" he asked, and Yuugi nodded.

"If he's having a glass, I will, too," Alexei said, passing his own down. Finally Yuugi raised his own. The rest of the party followed suit.

"To friends and success."

They toasted friends and success and drank.

"Okay, dig in."

* * *

Anzu helped Yuugi carry dishes to the kitchen, then pulled a clean stack of saucers out of the cupboard.

"Do you want me carry these, or the cake?"

"I've got the cake." Yuugi reached into the freezer and pulled out an ice cream cake.

"Did you get anything special put on it?"

Yuugi shook his head. "Ice cream cake doesn't need anything special. It's ice cream cake."

Anzu giggled. "That's true."

Yuugi backed into the dining room and set the cake on the table.

"So are you going to just sit outside with a bouquet of flowers until she comes to the window?"

"Just don't try to serenade her, Jounouchi. You'll kill her."

"It's so damn nice to not be the one getting ribbed on," Tony commented. Jounouchi turned red.

"Come on, you guys, it was only one date. And it was really kind of casual. It's not like it was dinner and a movie or something."

Yuugi began doling out pieces of cake. "What, Atem, you're not going to get in on the pickfest?"

Atem actually smiled. "I thought I wasn't allowed."

Tony snorted into his glass. Jounouchi turned to Atem.

"You're being half-decent. How did you pick up guys?"

Atem raised an eyebrow. "I'm the pharaoh."

Laughter ran a friendly ring around the table. Jounouchi flushed.

"Well, yeah, but didn't you ever, you know, pretend to be a commoner and go out among the people, or something?"

Atem shook his head. "Why would I? If I wanted to go out, I could go out. Nobody was going to stop me."

Jounouchi turned to Tony, who shook his head.

"You don't want to know, Mario. I promise. Probably not decent enough for your type."

Jounouchi turned even redder as Anzu slid back into her place next to him. Yuugi handed her a piece of cake.

"Okay, Anzu, spill."

Anzu blushed. "Spill what?"

"You've had that look all night. What's your news?" Yuugi raised an eyebrow at her.

Anzu's blush deepened. "I don't know what you mean, Yuugi."

"Anzu . . . "

Anzu bit her lip and smiled shyly. "Well . . . "

"Come on." Yuugi took a bite of cake. His eyes fluttered shut. "Mmmm. Right. You had news."

"I . . . Saturday's my last day at the club."

A murmur went around the table. Honda leaned forward, a piece of cake halfway to his mouth.

"You _quit_?"

Anzu nodded. Her smile grew wider. "And on Monday . . . I start rehearsal for my first professional show."

"No way!"

Anzu nodded. Yuugi jumped up, circled the table, and bearhugged her from behind. Anzu laughed as he gave her a wholehearted kiss on the cheek.

"Congratulations!"

"So what show you doing, Pretty Girl?" Tony leaned forward as Yuugi retreated to his own seat. Anzu practically glowed.

"It's a musical. Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat."

Atem frowned. "It sounds complicated."

"It's not. It's really for kids. It's about a boy whose father gives him a coat of many colors, but his brothers get jealous and – "

Comprehension dawned on Atem's face. "And sell him into slavery in Egypt, where he wins the favor of the gods and saves the country from famine."

Anzu's mouth dropped open. "You know the story of Joseph?"

Atem shrugged. "I know a story about a boy named Meriatum. But it's possible his name was changed to reflect his rank. That happened a lot."

"Now that's a story I'd like to hear," Tony commented. Atem eyed him suspiciously.

"Why?"

Tony shrugged. "Personal interest. Anthropology major's curse."

Yuugi stopped with a piece of cake halfway to his mouth. "What kind of major?"

"Studying people."

Yuugi nodded and finished his cake. "You should tell us sometime, Atem."

"I'm more interested in this boy Joseph Anzu's talking about, aibou. I could probably tell you Meriatum's story in my sleep."

Anzu shrugged. "There's not much else to tell. It's a dance show, and I'm in ensemble." She bounced in her seat. "I can't wait!"

"Then don't!" Jounouchi grabbed her hand and pulled her out of her seat. Anzu squealed as he twirled her around.

"Jounouchi, stop! Ryou, help me!"

Ryou started laughing as Jounouchi spun her around again, then started to tickle her. Yuugi tried to stifle his laughter.

"Come on, Jounouchi, don't."

Jounouchi hugged Anzu tightly before twirling her back to her seat. Anzu sat back down, her entire face a becoming shade of red. Honda reached across the table to offer her a high-five.

"Way to go, Anzu."

Alexei raised his glass. "It may be a bit late, but I say we toast success. To Anzu."

Yuugi picked up his own glass. "Seconded. To Anzu."

Anzu followed suit as the rest of the party raised their remaining wine in a toast. "To really, really, really good friends."

* * *

Yuugi rolled over as a familiar weight settled itself on the other side of the bed.

"You finished the dishes already?"

Atem shrugged. "They'll be there tomorrow. You'll be halfway across town." He curled up against Yuugi's back. Yuugi snuggled into his arms.

"I've missed this."

"I've missed you, aibou."

"Mmmmmmm." Yuugi rolled over and tucked his head beneath Atem's chin. "I'm glad it's all over, that's all."

"So am I." He placed a kiss on top of Yuugi's head. "I'm sorry about this, though." He reached for Yuugi's plaster-covered wrist. Yuugi smiled against his neck.

"Don't be." He sighed and curled closer. "It's worth it."

"Aibou?"

"Mmm-hmm?"

"Why didn't you ever give up? You could have died."

"Some things are worth dying for, angel."

Atem raised an eyebrow. "So now I'm an angel, too? Aibou, you give me too much credit."

"Hey, nobody ever said angels can't misbehave."

Atem chuckled, a low sound deep in his chest.  
_  
_"Aishiteru, aibou."

"Mmmm. Aishiteru."

"Good night."


End file.
